By Hutchinson Sports Information
DENISON, Tex. – The No. 17-ranked Hutchinson Community College softball team suffered its first loss of the season on Friday, falling 6-2 to Eastern Oklahoma State in the opening game of the THF Winter Blast.
Hutchinson’s second game against Grayson College was canceled because of weather conditions. Saturday’s game for the Blue Dragons (4-1) are at 10 a.m. against Paris Junior College and 2:30 p.m. against Weatherford College.
Eastern Oklahoma State took advantage of early Blue Dragon walks and errors to score five runs in their first three at-bats on Friday.
Sophomore Kierstan Weitze (2-1) started her first game of the season and allowed five hits and five runs over 2 1-3 innings. Weitze struck out two and walked three.
Freshman pitchers Korri Lies and Delaney Blakesley slowed down Eastern’s offense. Lies allowed one run with one hit and two strikeouts in three innings. Blakesley had a strikeout in a scoreless 1 2-3 innings.
Offensively, the Blue Dragons didn’t get their first hit off Eastern’s Makenzie Martin until the sixth inning, an Olivia Sandoval single.
The Dragons were held to a season-low three hits – singles by Sandoval, Allie Stipsits and Grace Sykora.
Stipsits had an RBI single with two out in the sixth inning to get the Dragons on the board, driving in Ella Dougherty. Sykora singled to lead off the seventh and later scored on a wild pitch.
The Blue Dragons were out-hit 6-3 and each team committed three errors.
